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Miss Irene Estelle Hough, 2704 N.
28th st, Omaha, Neb., has been chos
en by the judges as the most beauti
ful telephone girl in America.
Miss Hough was picked from
among severaT hundred contestants
submitted in a nation-wide contest.
This search was inaugurated when
Essanay recently made the an
nouncement that the role of "Doro
thy" in "The Woman's Way," that of
a beautiful telephone girl, should
rightly be played by the most beauti
ful operator in America. The search
closed Saturday, Nov. 21. Miss
Hough came to Chicago, Thursday,
Nov. 26, as the guest of the Essanay
Film Manufacturiing Co. and posed
before the motion picture camera in
the Essaney studios. For her day's
services Miss Hough receives $100 in
cash and the expenses of herself and
mother to Chicago and back and dur
ing her visit.
She had just put on her hat at the
Webster exchange, preparatory to
going home when the pleasant news
was flashed to her over the wire from
Chicago.
"I have hardly begun to wonder
what it will be like yet and have hard
ly f ealized that I, out of all those girls,
have really been chosen to play Doro
thy," said Miss Hough.
"Of course, I am delighted and will
be glad to go to Chicago and do the
very best 1 can. I am not afraid of
anything I may have to do with a
switchboard, but I do not know what
sort of an actress I will make."
Miss Hough is nearly 20, has light
hair and blue gray eyes, with a very
winning smile. Her friends, who in
clude every girl at the Webster ex
change, are certain she will make a
most attractive Dorothy.
"I think it's just splendid to have a
girl chosen from Omaha and from the
Webster -exchange, at that. Irene is
the most popular girl in the exchange.
My photograph was sent in, but I am
more pleased that she won that if I
Clark, one of the Webster operators.
Miss Marguerite Martens echoed all
her enthusiasm.
They were the only two Webster
exchange girls who knew last night
that Miss Hough had been chosen to
play Dorothy, but today the entire ex
change was simply buzzing with the
news and soon every phone girl in the
city knew that an Omaha girl was to
be the famous telephone heroine in
the Essanay drama.
She was one of the girls at the
Webster exchange on duty when the
terrible Easter tornado swept over
the city.
She remained at her post through
all that awful night and the next day
without sleep or rest
Although the window nearly broke
into splinters and she was covered
with broken glass and debris from the
storm, Miss Hough stayed at her post,
working the switchboard.
She kept her head then and worked
steadily regardless of the storm. She
did not know if her own family was
safe. Victims of the tornado were
groaning and crying in the telephone
exchange, which had been turned into
a hospital, but she stayed at her post.
Miss Hough says she's still "heart
whole and fancy free."
Kl-Yl! FAST LIVERS WHZH'T
TIME Tb WATCH THEIR
SPEEDOMETERS!
1
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had won myself," said Miss Leota I
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